Dev Q&A?

Just throwing an idea out there that might help with the whole information flow. Alot of games with loyal player bases have regular Q&A between the devs and players. Below is a recent example from an unnamed game.

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Q: Will you add engineers with the ability to repair vehicles and resupply ammo?

A: We don’t expect to see people running behind tanks in battle and fixing them with a magic wrench, but we are looking into adding secondary functionalities to certain character classes that could, for example, reduce resource consumption and keep things rolling; we could also imagine an ability to salvage broken vehicles and redeploy them. The design for such special skills is not yet final.

If you are curious to know more about what is happening behind the scenes, check out the rest of Part 4 here: Developer Q&A Fall 2013 – Part 4

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If it works elsewhere, why can't it work here? I don't know where this is in the realm of possibility. If the actual devs on this game are located overseas, there's really no mechanism for a real-time discussion. But the mods here could take a rollup of the top 10/50/whatever questions, and get some kind of scheduled response. Such as monthly, or quarterly.

Again, just throwing it out there to see what the interest level would be. Tynon is by far the most expensive game I've played, and also the most illusive as far as information. I think random broad-brushed announcements such as the one today go a little ways towards giving us "some" kind of clue what's going on, but still remains far from addressing concerns alot of players have.

Any thoughts?

I know this would be a shot in the dark.

But this is a very good idea that danni has presented. I'm all for it.

thumbs up for this!

I 110% agree. I have seen this in other games, and would love it here

Forgot to add--I think it could work, in that most of the groundwork can be done between the players and mods at our level. So Dawn and the dev team don't even get involved until the questions are compiled on the user end. All we'd need is a mod to send them up, and the answers to be published as a rollup on forums, depending on what timeline the devs could answer on. I think it might be a way for us all to track issues, possibly avoid rehashing the same threads, and funnel questions/concerns into some kind of routine.

I think it's a long shot as well. But currently it seems the ombudsman function here works like a nuclear power plant, where things reach critical mass and it sparks a blowout or quick-fix answer. This also forces the mods into a henchman role to manage it all, because we get lively and obnoxious and don't like being ignored. I see some kind of Q&A helping to defuse this, and establish a more efficient line of communication between players and devs. Even better if it was a known quantity as part of a routine. Players submit questions to a Q&A thread by x date, mods screen and show refined list on y date. A bit of wiggle room if someone needs to argue the case of why something else needs to be added, then forward up to dev team, and get a answer on z date. Obviously the kicker is getting the devs to commit to answering questions on a routine basis, but anyone who's been on other games knows information and transparency tend to lead to less anarchy.

You've put forward an interesting suggestion here, Danni. However, as volunteers we only mod in our spare time so if there's a flaw it's whether we have the spare hours to sift through and compile the questions to forward on to the devs.

uCool in general prefer players to 'work out' the mechanics of their games themselves. Only updating when new additions are being launched. It doesn't mean I agree with that policy but that is how it is.

This doesn't mean I disagree with your idea, I do think it has merit but I'm just asking about the practicalities.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Morgan le Fay

You've put forward an interesting suggestion here, Danni. However, as volunteers we only mod in our spare time so if there's a flaw it's whether we have the spare hours to sift through and compile the questions to forward on to the devs.

uCool in general prefer players to 'work out' the mechanics of their games themselves. Only updating when new additions are being launched. It doesn't mean I agree with that policy but that is how it is.

This doesn't mean I disagree with your idea, I do think it has merit but I'm just asking about the practicalities.

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It would work if it was kept really simple. Make one thread titled 4th Quarter Q&A, for example. Open it for a certain period of time, like a day or two or whatever works. Close it, filter out the inevitable "duh" questions that someone is sure to put in there that are answered in another thread, or deemed inappropriate. Put out the list of possibles in numerical order, and each person votes on say 2 or 3 by just replying to the thread with "1/3/5 or 1/2/20." Pick the 5 or 10 (preferably more if its a quarterly thing), and essentially it acts like a straw poll to what's most on people's minds.

I understand UCool might not like to talk about game mechanics, so those questions can be filtered. But something such as "when can we expect to see new heros?" would be something that would be helpful and non-mechanic related. Perhaps it can also help the dev team focus on the aspects of the game that would provide the biggest returns. Such as, devoting time and resources into one awesome event may not yield the same sustainability as fixing other issues that are of concern to the.

I dunno, just throwing things out there to try.

That's all I wanted to Danni, just some clarification on how it would be presented. If that's the case it might work.

A monthly/quarterly Q&A with the actual devs or an official representative would be interesting. We asked for that several times while playing Evony, but the closest we got was a thread that dawn or deucalion moderated about suggestions for Age II. uCool and their predecessor are both notoriously tight-lipped about everything, and it's left to the mods to referee their angry customer base.

This is an idea that I would love to see come to light here in the forums. The interaction from uCool side as of late has been scarce, and it is frustrating (not just because I say so, but because that's what it is) to be stuck without progression for such long periods of time. On the other hand there still are alot of glitches that still persist. These can be JUST as frustrating. Some form of controlled documentation would be more than helpful with not only collecting info for devs to work with, but also would allow the players to vent in a constructive manner and be part of the bigger picture here in Tynon. Hoping to see this put to use in some form or another.

I'll rather have the devs working on new stuff, rather than coming here more often(because they're in the forums- I know who they're) and just post on forums when Dawnseeker will post news regularly.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Boroeast

I'll rather have the devs working on new stuff, rather than coming here more often(because they're in the forums- I know who they're) and just post on forums when Dawnseeker will post news regularly.

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In contary to popular belief, they do! Why? We can see who's viewed the threads :).

And to be honest Boro I agree.

To support this

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dawnseeker

As for your feedback not being considered, it seems to me that no matter how much we solicit and collect feedback, some will not be convinced that we are listening. It doesn't seem to matter that I made a thread specifically asking for player feedback about several concepts, we were deemed to "not be listening" because I didn't run a commentary on feedback that was posted.

Feedback threads are very simple, and I'll post this in future feedback threads.

We post about some ideas or concepts that we're implementing or considering. Players offer their comments. Multiple developers, who do not post on the forums, browse the thread at their leisure to get a feel for potential issues or concerns that may arise from the development. They make decisions accordingly. I intentionally do not get involved in the discussion because I don't want to become an "Ask Dawnseeker" thread or for people to address other concerns to me simply because they believe they have my attention.

I can only state this so many times in so many ways: Multiple developers read the feedback threads, and they don't want to see my opinions. They want to see your opinions.

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Like I say, you all can't see it.
TyTony comes on forums a lot- I believe he only posted once. But he looks at many many many threads, specially in Bug Reports.
There are other devs and other Tynon Employees here.

http://prntscr.com/1xox5p

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Boroeast

To support this


Like I say, you all can't see it.
TyTony comes on forums a lot- I believe he only posted once. But he looks at many many many threads, specially in Bug Reports.
There are other devs and other Tynon Employees here.

http://prntscr.com/1xox5p

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So...if "we all" can't see it how does that help us?

And yes, Dawn did post after starting his feedback thread. However, his post was on a completely different topic than the one he started. Hence why we think the input isn't being listened to.

I get it, people can come view the threads. You don't even have to be a Tynon player to view threads. But the point of a Q&A is specifics. It doesn't do the players any good to know there's a vague dev presence out there, somewhere. I don't see why someone can't or won't step up and answer questions on a quarterly basis, which is pretty minimal in comparison to alot of games--which I say without the intent of flaming, baiting or trolling. IMHO, intentionally sidestepping even a controlled dialogue tells me that the development isn't following a particular path, or the release was rushed ahead of schedule, hence why it's still cooking in the test tube like a beta while being sold as "live."

Quote:

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Originally Posted by xxdannisouthxx_7889427

So...if "we all" can't see it how does that help us?

And yes, Dawn did post after starting his feedback thread. However, his post was on a completely different topic than the one he started. Hence why we think the input isn't being listened to.

I get it, people can come view the threads. You don't even have to be a Tynon player to view threads. But the point of a Q&A is specifics. It doesn't do the players any good to know there's a vague dev presence out there, somewhere. I don't see why someone can't or won't step up and answer questions on a quarterly basis, which is pretty minimal in comparison to alot of games--which I say without the intent of flaming, baiting or trolling. IMHO, intentionally sidestepping even a controlled dialogue tells me that the development isn't following a particular path, or the release was rushed ahead of schedule, hence why it's still cooking in the test tube like a beta while being sold as "live."

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You don't need permission to view threads or anyone else does.

A thread like this was closed couple of weeks ago.
You're not the only one who have think about this.

Hence will I'll close this one as well.

This is a good idea, but as I explained in another thread, we can't answer "when" questions.